Dave Kemp: West Brom need a winning mentality

Tony Pulis, Dave Kemp, Gerry Francis and Terry Burton look on from the stand against Gateshead

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Tony Pulis’ long-time right-hand man was part of the Stoke back-room team that regularly saw their side wallop the Baggies in a winning streak that began in the early 1990s and shows no signs of abating.

Kemp says Albion’s soft touch was always evident.

“Before you come into West Bromwich Albion, the view from outside is that it’s a good, strong football club, great tradition, good fans, there are a lot of positives about it.

"Having been here a couple of months now, it lives up to that reputation when you’re on the inside,” Kemp told the Albion News.

“But if there’s one thing we want to change about it, it’s to give the football club a winning mentality.

"Without being unkind, whatever team I’ve been at over the years, I’ve always felt that, although Albion have always had good players and played good football, you always felt like you’d got a chance of beating them.

Dave Kemp during his time at Stoke

“Our attitude over the period ahead is that we want to play good football, but we want to win as well, we want the other team wishing they weren’t up against West Bromwich Albion this week.

"That’s the most obvious thing that we are working to change here.”

Albion are eight points clear of the drop zone head of Saturday’s clash with Stoke.

“We’ve made some progress, but you’re not going to do it overnight, it takes time,” says Kemp.

“What has impressed all of us has been the reaction of the fans.

"If you go back to the Southampton game a fortnight ago, you could see they were buying into it.

“They could see the players were having a right go and I think they responded to that.

"As we’ve found out, unfortunately it doesn’t mean you are going to win every game but if the team is giving it everything, doing the best they can whatever the circumstances, I think supporters will react positively to that.”